The official focus
of our segment in the Vancouver Parks Board meeting was
the proposal by Parks Board Commissioner Marty Zlotnick
to basically rule out any referendum process on any
thing that has to do with the Vancouver Aquarium, be it
its planned 30% expansion, or further acquisition of
whales and dolphins.

There were 26
speakers in total, listed below in chronological order
of speaking, and color-coded for
good and evil,
5 minutes each.

1. Anthony Marr (HOPE-CARE)

2. Kelly Bunting (Coalition for No Whales in
Captivity)

3. Janos Mate (Whale Friends)

4. Anita Romaniuk (ex? ParksBoard commissioner)

5. Lea Johnson

6. Robert Light

7. Bruella Battista

8. Keith Edwards

9. Isabel Minty

10. Stuart Makinnon (Green Party of Vancouver)

11. Joan Reekie

12. Laura McDiarmid

13. Jamie Lee Hamilton

14. Rebeka
Breder (tentative)

15. Ron Rothwell

16. Janet Lenarduzzi (Chair, Vancouver Aquarium)

17. Stephen Thompson (Sea Shepherd)

18. Clint Wright (VP Operations and Animal Care,
Vancouver Aquarium)

19. Tom Mayenknecht

20. Martin Haulenna (Veterinarian, Vancouver
Aquarium)

21. Penny Hentzel (Volunteer, Vancouver Aquarium)

22. Eleanor Hadley

23. Brook Wade (Board Director, Vancouver
Aquarium)

24. Jim Varah (Volunteer, Vancouver Aquarium)

25. Carolyne Varah (Volunteer, Vancouver Aquarium)

26. John Nightingale (Executive Director,
Vancouver Aquarium)

Being the first
speaker, and presumably the only person in the room to
have performed missions in Japan, I saw my task as
setting the platform, the main concern, the deep
focus and the tone. I deliberately ignored the
subject on the table (the Zlotnick
motion) out of contempt (the biggest insult is to
ignore), and concentrated on the global ramification of
hundred of individual aquaria buying a few dolphins
each, even if certain aquaria (e.g. the Vancouver
Aquarium) have policies to not purchase dolphins caught
from the wild ("Japan will just capture more young
female dolphins to breed captive-born babies which the
"civilized" aquariums would then purchase.") I
pointed out that at $20,000+ per captured dolphin and
only $500 in meat per slaughtered dolphin, it is the
dolphin-capture industry that is driving the
dolphin-slaughter industry ("If no aquarium buys any
dolphin, the slaughter industry would cease, and 20,000
dolphins a year would be saved."). At one point,
the chairperson, one of the pro-Zlotnick commissioners,
ordered me to get on topic. I responded "I'm
sorry, commissioner, but my stand on the topic should be
clear. I will use my time allotment to press my
point. I want all present with the power to vote
to have a clear picture of what they will be voting on
before they vote, and I hope when they do that they will
be voting with their conscience." He let me fnish.
I concluded by saying "With what I have outlined, if the
Vancouver Aquarium still purchases dolphins from Japan,
you will have the blood of 20,000 dead dolphins on your
hands, year after year."

Obviously, someone
from our side had to address the official topic (the
Zlotnick motion, which has more to do with democracy
than animal rights), and Kelly
Bunting took it up with gusto, and every
speaker after her, all in
all a powerful performance.

One of our
speakers quoted MacKenzie King that those opposed to a
referendum are the ones who are afraid of losing.

There were about
ten speakers from the Aquarium, and they were scheduled
towards the end, with Dr. John
Nightingale given the honor of the grand finale
and the last word. Steve
Thompson
had the misfortune of being placed in the midst of
Aquarium speakers, but his combative eloquence did
Sea Shepherd proud.
(Could you post a summary of your
speeches, Kelly and Steve?)

Eleanor Hadley (age 83)
brought up the rear, whose speech moved Steve to make a
special trip across the chamber-floor to shake her hand.

After the
speeches, the commissioners (6) took a vote - 4-2 in
favor of the Zlotnick motion. We groaned. At
least one woman on our side broke into tears.

Here is my take on this matter:

1. We were unwitting poster boys/girls for the
system to deomonstrate to the TV viewing public (very
dangerous voters in the case of a referendum) how
democratic "our" societal mechanism is (I mean, if this
were China, I would have been led away in mid-speech and
thrown into the slammer, and the key thrown away,
right?).

2. Not a single word we uttered meant a hoot to
the pro-Zlotnick commissioners (including of course
Zlotnick himself). They may as well have put on
head phones and listened to elevator music; the result
would have been the same. Not a word that poured
out from our hearts made one smidgeon of difference to
these commisioners. The whole thing was
premeditated, preplanned, predetermined, rigged, staged,
signed, seal, delivered, on TV.

3. The Parks Board and the Aquarium have become
one ("breathing through the same nostril", in graphic
Chinese slang). They can plan behind closed doors
at will, and twist any rule in their favor.

This meeting is the last straw in my humble
opinion. While there is no doubt we have to continue
following this avenue of pursuit (since the avenue
exists, and since we can), but to follow it and it
alone is to fight in the enemies' arena, by their
rule, with whatever weapon they allow us. To ask
them to do anything is to give them power - ours.
And to react to their initiatives in which they have
total control, and even to protest their actions, is to
submit to their will.

We
should by all mean continue to speak at their meetings,
but our interest in doing so should be mainly to take
advantage of these soapboxes that they provide us to
speak our minds, perchance to reach the broader public
through media (within the room itself, our words would
by and large fall on deaf ears). In this we can be
highly successful.

But this alone is not enough. We must create
initiatives of our own, where the enemies have
to fight in our arena, by our rule,
with the weapons that we allow them.

As
to what such an initiative is, it is limited only by our
imagination, courage, determination and stamina.